The French offices of Elon Musk’s X Corp. were raided today as part of a preliminary investigation into allegations that the company may have spread images of child sexual abuse, as well as other alleged crimes.
The raid was carried out by the French police’s cybercrime unit, the prosecutor’s cybercrime unit and Europol. Musk (pictured) has been issued a voluntary summons to answer questions, as has Linda Yaccarino, X’s former chief executive.
“The voluntary interviews with the managers should enable them to explain their position on the facts and, where applicable, the compliance measures envisaged,” the prosecutor’s office said in a statement. It explained, “At this stage, the conduct of the investigation is based on a constructive approach, with the aim of ultimately ensuring that the X platform complies with French law, as it operates on the national territory.”
Musk and Yaccarino are expected to respond to a litany of possible crimes, including the possession and promulgation of “child pornography images,” the violation of people’s privacy rights related to the generation of deep fake images, the unlawful extraction of data, and Holocaust denial.
The probe was launched in July last year. At the time, X said in a statement that the investigation “egregiously undermines X’s fundamental right to due process and threatens our users’ rights to privacy and free speech.”
Today, the company issues another statement following the Paris raid. Its Global Government Affairs account on X called the allegations “baseless,” adding that the company “categorically denies any wrongdoing.” The company accused the raid of being “an abusive act of law enforcement theater designed to achieve illegitimate political objectives rather than advance legitimate law enforcement goals.”
Elon Musk also took to X, writing that the investigation and raid “is a political attack.”
X, like a number of U.S. tech giants, has long been in the crosshairs of the European nations and the E.U. At the end of 2025, X was fined about $140 million for violating the Digital Services Act, or DSA – just one of the fines the bloc has levied against American tech firms that has rankled President Trump.
Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr
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